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The Rewards and Risk of Service: A Cautionary Tale

Service is a major tool of recovery. But it can also be dangerous.

Mood music for this post: “Serve the Servants” by Nirvana:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtB6gEmr6ZY&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Last night was one of service. I drove down to Salem State College to talk to graduating seniors about their portfolios and resumes. It was the least I could do, after all that college did for my career.

It was energizing to talk to the students, who are full of hope and ambition, not yet jaded by the throat-cutting ways of corporate America. And it was good to see Judi Puritz Cook, Ellen Golub and Robert Brown. Ellen was adviser to the Salem State Log while I was there. We were among her most trouble-making, rebellious charges. I’m proud of this.

After that I dropped by the home of old friends. Their son is going through a lot of the turmoil I went through as a kid, and I’m trying to help him out by teaching him some of the tools I’ve developed for the OCD and addictive behavior.

On the way home I spent some phone time with someone I’m sponsoring in OA.

By 5 a.m. I was back online, following up with students I didn’t get a chance to sit with last night.

I treasure service to others. It’s an important part of my Faith and my recovery. It’s odd that I feel this way, since I used to prefer isolating myself in a dark room, watching TV and shoving pint after pint of ice cream, canned pasta and other junk down my throat and occasionally taking breaks to smoke cigarettes.

Service, in fact, is one of the main tools of recovery in OA. It’s not just about helping other people. It’s about building and improving relationships, putting the stresses of your life in perspective and realizing your troubles are never as bad as you think. You’re not just helping someone who is down on their luck. They are helping you back, though they don’t realize it most of the time.

Sponsorship is a good example.

By sponsoring others, it forces you to work harder at your own recovery. My sponsor helps me every day, but I also take time to hear how she’s doing and offer advice.

It’s all about realizing we’re all in this together.

But there’s some caution to deliver here.

Service is a tricky tool that can explode in your face if not used responsibly.

The risk for me is that I take on too much. I can’t say no when there’s volunteering to do at church or someone in OA needs my time. Being a control freak doesn’t help.

I also have a job that keeps me busy, and doing good work on the job — writing articles that help security professionals do their jobs better and helping out colleagues when they need it — is also essential to my well-being.

The work thing used to be about pleasing the bosses. Then I woke up one day and realized it’s stupid trying to be a people pleaser.

The point, though, is that if I do a great job of volunteering all the time, the work can suffer and then someone who deserves my best gets screwed. Fortunately, I’m a lot better at this balancing act than I used to be.

The danger with sponsorship and helping friends in need is that you as a human being can only do so much. My instinct is to drop in and make their lives better in an instant. But it doesn’t work that way. I have a busy family life with two small boys. They must always come first, which means I have to take care not to get consumed by someone else’s troubles.

I have to remember that I can offer up what I know, but at the end of the day only the folks I’m trying to help can truly pull themselves out of the hole.

With sponsorship and giving students career advice there’s another danger: By trying to help too many people, I end up not helping any of them very much.

All perils aside, it’s great to be in the mental place I’m at right now. You all deserve thanks for that, because your service has helped me. Even though you probably don’t realize you were doing anything.

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This is Your Brain on Restlessness

The author has hit a wall with his recovery. But it’s not what you think.

Mood music for this post: “Don’t Cry” by Guns N Roses:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRIbf6JqkNc&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

I’ve moved past yesterday’s tiredness to a state of restlessness.

By brain is at war with itself. One side wants to buckle down and tackle the editing and administrative tasks on the table. The other side wants to write a few more articles first. I have leftover material from last week.

I’m also thinking a lot about my recovery. I’ve been abstinent from binge eating since October 1, 2008 and sober from alcohol since Christmas 2009. But I still can’t seem to survive without coffee and Red Bull or the occasional cigar.

The natural conclusion is that my recovery has hit a plateau.

I’m doing well for the most part. The eating habits are in check. I can now function at events without a glass of wine in my hand at all times. But I feel restless about something. I think it’s the need to take my recovery to the next level.

That means a couple things. One, I need to start sponsoring other people in the 12-Step program. I’ve been dipping my toe in the water on that one, but I’ve mostly held back, believing that it’s hard enough to take care of my own recovery without worrying about someone else’s. Two: It’s time for me to start doing what’s called a “Big-book Study.” That’s a gathering where people do the really deep study of the 12 Steps. I’ve read the steps over and over again and I try my best to live them every day. But until you’ve done the deeper study, you’re just scraping the surface.

Or so I’ve been told.

So it looks like I have two new goals for the summer.

This self-control thing is a bitch. But it beats the hell out of the alternative.

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Skeptic Slang and Charles Manson: Six Degrees of Separation

Skeptic Slang and a glimpse at mental illness in the making.

Mood music for this post: “My Monkey” by Marylin Manson:

A note about the music: Marilyn Manson put this on his “Portrait of an American Family” album, which was recorded in the Sharon Tate murder house. The title and chorus were taken from a Charles Manson song called “Mechanical Man.” Bits of Manson interviews are sprinkled throughout.

It just seemed appropriate for some reason…

Today was a good day with some strange memories thrown into the mix. Call it Skeptic Slang day.

I put the kids in the car (Erin was at a writing and editing conference) and drove to the Salem, Mass. home of my former Skeptic Slang guitarist, Chris Casey, his wife Nancy and their two sweet kids, Melissa and Mark.

I was there for a few reasons: to help Nancy set up a blog for her own writings, which I suggest you follow, and to look at photos she had of our old band. Most of all, I just wanted to see a couple old friends. I’ve known Nancy for 20 years and their marriage is a point of pride for me because I introduced them way back in the day.

So I looked at the Skeptic Slang pictures and noticed something I initially found funny. But later, back in the car, it occurred to me that the images were a bit jarring. They reminded me of something I had forgotten about myself back then.

I’m wearing a Charles Manson shirt. And with the long hair and beard, I sort of resemble the creep:

But looking back, it was an awful shirt to be wearing.
The other thing I noticed in the pictures was that I had angry eyes.
In another picture I have my hand over my face. I remember now that I was agitated as hell during that photo shoot because it was taking a long time and the thought of me being photographed made me sick.
Indeed, that was a very angry time for me. A family member was suffering from severe depression and suicidal thoughts. I was in full rage against my mother and step-mother. More than one Skeptic Slang song was about wishing my mother dead. In fact, one song was called “You’re Dead,” as in dead in my mind.
I was still pissed as all hell about my brother’s death eight years before.
The mess in my skull that would ultimately blossom into full-blown mental disorder was starting to swirl. The bitter roots had taken hold.
Fortunately, the band itself was an excellent release valve at the time. I couldn’t really sing, but it didn’t matter. We played aggressively, and that allowed the rage in me to pour out like sweat that I could then wash off.
God has always had a funny way of giving me the things I needed to lurch forward.
And while the band is long gone, I got some lifelong friends out of it.
The fact that we can now hang out and watch our kids hang out with each other is just freakin’ awesome.
http://youtu.be/pA2ktUcWX7Q
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Meet My Demon

Why the author treats his demon like an imaginary friend, and how it helps.

It won’t give up

It wants me dead

God damn that noise inside my head

From today’s mood music, “The Becoming,” by Trent Reznor, Nine Inch Nails:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDfyR22u_gI&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

At last night’s OA meeting, I saw quite a few people with heavy weights pressing on their minds. I won’t share details, because these meetings are all about anonymity. But it got me thinking…

You see, for all our awful behavior, there’s one thing we addicts do exceptionally well: self-criticize. If you want to meet people who are good at focusing on their own vulnerabilities and venting shame, we are the best there is.

It doesn’t really help us, mind you. It just makes us feel worse and, in response, lose ourselves in our chosen addiction. In OA, the addiction is compulsive overeating. But it’s the same with booze and narcotics.

We often describe it as our inner demon. The demon comes to you when you are feeling low and taps on your shoulder. Then he suggests you sooth your anxieties with a pile of junk.

Many of those who suffer from mental illnesses — mine is OCD, which fuels my addictive behavior — tend to give their demon a persona.

Winston Churchill called it his Black Dog.

I call my demon The Asshole. That’s what he is, after all. He’s my dysfunctional imaginary friend.

I got the idea of making my demon an imaginary friend from my kids, both of whom have imaginary friends. I believe Sean used to call his “Rexally.” Rexally was a sperm whale, by the way.

So let me tell you about The Asshole.

He’s like one of those overbearing relatives who will constantly push food on you when you drop by for dinner.

The Asshole: “Try that slice of pizza. It’s wonderful.”

Me: “No thanks. I’m full.”

The Asshole: “Come on, try it. It’s really good.”

If I’m not in recovery, I shove the slice of pizza down my throat, followed by another 10 slices. When it comes to binge eating, I can’t have just five of something, whether it’s pizza or potato chips. I have to have them all, and when they’re gone I’ll keep pushing other things in my mouth, no matter how vile and shameful I feel two hours later.

When I am in recovery, which, thank God, I am now, I tell The Asshole: “Piss off. I’m full and got things to do.”

Facing The Asshole used to fill me with fear and anxiety. I was the weakest person in the room when he was around.

But in the years since I entered therapy for the OCD, found my Faith and started taking medication, the relationship has changed.

Now The Asshole is more like an annoying cousin; someone I keep at arm’s length. I don’t shut him out of my life completely — I can’t, really — but one day I stopped fearing him, and that made a world of difference.

He still taps my shoulder just about every day. But with the fear gone, I’m able to go about my business.

Another thing that’s changed: What he has to offer just can’t compare with the other parts of my life: My wife and kids. My writing. A good book.

But I’m not stupid. I know he’s never going to go away. He’ll always be there, lying in wait. He’s like a terrorist, that old Asshole. He may lose most days, but he keeps trying, knowing that one of these days he might just pull off the attack.

And, truth be told, I’m never more than a few minutes away from the relapse. It’s that way with anyone in recovery.

And so I must be careful.

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The OCD Diaries 4-2-10: Long-haired Freaks

Mood music for this post: “Hurt,” by Johnny Cash (cover of the Nine Inch Nails song):

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o22eIJDtKho&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Going through an old stack of books this afternoon, I found this photo:

I’m on the left holding the bass. On the right is Sean Marley. I told you about him in the post “Marley and Me.”

The photo is one of those stupid mock rock magazine covers, shot in the summer of 1989 at a carnival on the grounds of the Suffolk Downs racetrack near Revere Beach.

It was a simpler time. I had seen my share of illness and death by then, but that summer was a more innocent era. As close to normal as things got back then.

My addictive behavior had already taken root but wasn’t yet at the self-destructive point. The OCD was there at that point, but I hadn’t yet become aware of the patterns. All I knew at that point was that I hated authority and I had a mighty temper.

Sean was a unique character with a dark side at that point, but he was not yet showing signs of a depression that would eventually kill him. That wouldn’t show its wretched face for another five years.

That summer was about parties in my basement, music and getting ready for college.

I had absolutely no clue what was ahead of me.

The kid in that picture wouldn’t like who I am today. He would despise the Catholicism and make fun of the 12-Step program. But we’d still have a love of heavy metal in common.

Come to think of it, if today I had to spend time in the same space as the kids in that picture, I probably wouldn’t like either of them all that much. I’d tolerate them though.

I’m Blessed beyond comprehension with the life I have today. But, admittedly, looking at that picture hurts a little. A lot of good people have come and gone since then.

It’s a little overwhelming to think about, so instead I’ll go to bed.


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The Flood

The author on how the deluge Massachusetts is experiencing is as brutal on the mind as it is on basements.

Mood music for this post: “Rain When I Die” by Alice in Chains:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMm0bpbOOkU&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

This isn’t a new topic for me, since I’ve mentioned it many times. But New England is currently getting pounded by another deluge, so it’s worth repeating.

This weather is brutal for people who suffer from depression. The dark-gray sky leaves the sufferer feeling as though they’re locked in a tomb.

Abraham Lincoln, who suffered from severe depression his whole life, was driven to the brink of suicide more than once in the 1840s — two decades before he was president — during periods of prolonged, intense rain, according to “Lincoln’s Melancholy” by Joshua Wolf Shenk.

It’s especially rough on children who suffer from anxiety. Just hearing the weatherman say the word flooding is enough to cause panic.

I tend to experience dark moods during heavy rains, but I think the short daylight of winter hits me harder. Fortunately, an adjustment of my Prozac intake has helped considerably.

Not much more to add here that I haven’t already said before, except that if you know someone who suffers from depression and addiction, show them some friendship and keep an eye out for them.

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An OCD Diaries Primer

A collection of posts that form the back story of this blog.

Mood music:

[spotify:track:19n9s9SfnLtwPEODqk8KCT]

The Long History of OCD

An OCD Christmas. The first entry, where I give an overview of how I got to crazy and found my way to sane.

The Bad Pill Kept Me from the Good Pill. How the drug Prednisone brought me to the brink, and how Prozac was part of my salvation.

The Crazy-Ass Guy in the Newsroom. Think you have troubles at work? You should see what people who worked with me went through.

The Freak and the Redhead: A Love Story. About the wife who saved my life in many ways.

Snowpocalypse and the Fear of Loss. The author remembers a time when fear of loss would cripple his mental capacities, and explains how he got over it — mostly.

The Ego OCD Built. The author admits to having an ego that sometimes swells beyond acceptable levels and that OCD is fuel for the fire. Go ahead. Laugh at him.

Fear Factor. The author describes years of living in a cell built by fear, how he broke free and why there’s no turning back.

Prozac Winter. The author discovers that winter makes his depression worse and that there’s a purely scientific explanation — and solution.

Have Fun with Your Therapist. Mental-illness sufferers often avoid therapists because the stigma around these “shrinks” is as thick as that of the disease. The author is here to explain why you shouldn’t fear them.

The Engine. To really understand how mental illness happens, let’s compare the brain to a machine.

 

Rest Redefined. The author finds that he gets the most relaxation from the things he once feared the most.

Outing Myself. The author on why he chose to “out” himself despite what other people might think.

Why Being a People Pleaser is Dumb. The author used to try very hard to please everybody and was hurt badly in the process. Here’s how he broke free and kept his soul intact.

The Addiction and the Damage Done

The Most Uncool Addiction. In this installment, the author opens up about the binge-eating disorder he tried to hide for years — and how he managed to bring it under control.

Edge of a Relapse. The author comes dangerously close to a relapse, but lives to fight another day.

The 12 Steps of Christmas. The author reviews the 12 Steps of Recovery and takes a personal inventory.

How to Play Your Addictions Like a Piano. The author admits that when an obsessive-compulsive person puts down the addiction that’s most self-destructive, a few smaller addictions rise up to fill the void. But what happens when the money runs out?

Regulating Addictive Food: A Lesson in Futility. As an obsessive-compulsive binge eater, the author feels it’s only proper that he weigh in on the notion that regulating junk food might help. Here’s why the answer is probably not.

The Liar’s Disease. The author reveals an uncomfortable truth about addicts like himself: We tend to have trouble telling the truth.

Portable Recovery. Though addiction will follow the junkie anywhere in the world, the author has discovered that recovery is just as portable.

Revere (Experiences with Addiction, Depression and Loss During The Younger Years)

Bridge Rats and Schoolyard Bullies. The author reviews the imperfections of childhood relationships in search of all his OCD triggers. Along the way, old bullies become friends and he realizes he was pretty damn stupid back then.

Lost Brothers. How the death of an older brother shaped the Hell that arrived later.

Marley and Me. The author describes the second older brother whose death hit harder than that of the first.

The Third Brother. Remembering Peter Sugarman, another adopted brother who died too early — but not before teaching the author some important lessons about life.

Revere Revisited.

Lessons from Dad. The author has learned some surprising lessons from Dad on how to control one’s mental demons.

The Basement. A photo from the old days in Revere spark some vivid flashbacks.

Addicted to Feeling Good. To kick off Lent, the author reflects on some of his dumber quests to feel good.

The lasting Impact of Crohn’s Disease. The author has lived most of his life with Crohn’s Disease and has developed a few quirks as a result.

The Tire and the Footlocker. The author opens up an old footlocker under the stairs and finds himself back in that old Revere basement.

Child of  Metal

How Metal Saved Me. Why Heavy Metal music became a critical OCD coping tool.

Insanity to Recovery in 8 Songs or Less. The author shares some videos that together make a bitchin’ soundtrack for those who wrestle with mental illness and addiction. The first four cover the darkness. The next four cover the light.

Rockit Records Revisited. The author has mentioned Metal music as one of his most important coping tools for OCD and related disorders. Here’s a look at the year he got one of the best therapy sessions ever, simply by working in a cramped little record store.

Metal to Stick in Your Mental Microwave.

Man of God

The Better Angels of My Nature. Why I let Christ in my life.

The Rat in the Church Pew. The author has written much about his Faith as a key to overcoming mental illness. But as this post illustrates, he still has a long way to go in his spiritual development.

Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely. The author goes to Church and comes away with a strange feeling.

Running from Sin, Running With Scissors. The author writes an open letter to the RCIA Class of 2010 about Faith as a journey, not a destination. He warns that addiction, rage and other bad behavior won’t disappear the second water is dropped over their heads.

Forgiveness is a Bitch. Seeking and giving forgiveness is essential for someone in recovery. But it’s often seen as a green light for more abuse.

Pain in the Lent. The author gives a progress report on the Lenten sacrifices. It aint pretty.


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A Suicide

The author’s message to some people mourning a friend’s suicide. He’s been there, so maybe these words will help.

Mood music for this post: “Murder in the City,” by the Avett Brothers:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aE7rkSELM3I&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Some acquaintances in the information security community are currently dealing with something I know about all too well — a friend taking their own life.

I don’t know these people very well, and I never met the woman they are now grieving over. But given the road I’ve traveled, I wanted to say something that might be helpful. Here goes…

You’re probably feeling kicked in the guts by this. You may have known your friend was depressed, even suicidal, but it never really clicked in your brain that this friend would actually DO IT.

Now you’re beating yourself over it because you’re certain that you saw the signs in hindsight and should have done something to help this person. You feel you weren’t the friend you should have been. Or brother. Or sister. Or parent.

Your brain is spinning like an old record, skipping as you replay the last few months in your head, over and over again. “How could you have missed the signs?” you ask yourself.

As everyone in your circle second guesses themselves, tensions and hard feelings bubble to the surface.

It can be too much to absorb. And the hurt will be there for a long time.

But things will get better. They always do.

Here are some of the things I’ve learned in the nearly 14 years since my friend’s death:

–Blaming yourself is pointless. No matter how many times you replay events in your mind, the fact is that it’s not your fault. For one thing, it’s impossible to get into the head of someone who is contemplating suicide. Sure, there are signs, but since we all get the blues sometimes, it’s very easy to dismiss the signs as something close to normal. When someone is loud in contemplating suicide, it’s usually a cry for help. When the depressed says nothing and even appears OK, it’s usually because they’ve made their decision and are in the quiet, planning stages.

–Blaming each other is even more pointless. Take it from me: Nerves in your circle of family and friends are so raw right now that it won’t take much for relationships to snap into pieces. A week after my friend’s death I wrote a column about it, revealing what in hindsight was too much detail. His family was furious and most of them haven’t talked to me since. They feel I was exploiting his death to advance my writing career and get attention. I was pretty screwed up back then, so they’re probably right. In any event, I don’t blame them for hating me. What I’ve learned, and this is tough to admit, is that you’re going to have to let it go when the finger pointing starts. It’s better not to engage the other side. Nobody is in their right mind at this point, so go easy on each other. Give people space to make their errors in judgment and learn from it.

–Don’t demonize the dead. When a friend takes their life, one of the things that gnaws at the survivors is the notion that — if there is a Heaven and Hell — those who kill themselves are doomed to the latter. I’m a devout Catholic, so you can bet your ass this one has gone through my mind. What I’ve learned though, through my own experiences in the years since, is that depression is a clinical disease. When you are mentally ill, your brain isn’t firing on all thrusters. You engage in self-destructive behavior even though you understand the consequences. A person thinking about suicide is not operating on a sane, normally-functioning mind. So to demonize someone for taking their own life is pointless. To demonize the person, you have to assume they were in their right mind at the time of the act. And you know they weren’t. My practice today is to simply pray for those people, that their souls will still be redeemed and they will know peace. It’s really the best you can do.

— Break the stigma. One of the friends left behind in this latest tragedy has already done something that honors her friend’s life: She went on Facebook and directed people toward the American Association of Suicidology website, specifically the page on knowing the warning signs. That’s a great example of doing something to honor your friend’s memory instead of sitting around second guessing yourself. The best thing to do now is educate people on the disease so that sufferers can help themselves and friends and family can really be of service.

–On with your own life. Nobody will blame you for not being yourself for awhile. You have, after all, just experienced one of the worst tragedies there is. But try not to let it paralyze you. Life must go on. You have to get on with your work and be there for those around you.

Don’t take what I’ve just said as Gospel. It’s based on my own experience and no two experiences are the same. But if there was something in there that’s helpful, then I’m grateful.

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The Long Road Through Self-Hatred

The author has learned that it’s damn hard to like yourself at the beginning of sobriety and abstinence. The feeling will pass. Eventually.

Mood music:

http://youtu.be/TP06kxW_M3I

A friend and fellow 12-Stepper just hit a major milestone in her recovery: 90 days of abstinence. In the world of compulsive overeating, think of this as 90 days of back-to-back sobriety.

She worked hard for this and has every reason to be bursting with joy. Yet she’s uneasy.

She doesn’t feel quite right in her skin.

She’s going through something a lot of us go through when we kick our addictions. To call it self hatred might be a stretch. I don’t think she dislikes herself. But now that her mind is clear of the intoxicating haze, she sees things about herself that she doesn’t like. She’s suddenly aware for the first time that she has some flaws that are tough to look at in the mirror.

For a lot of people, it can become a matter of self hatred. It certainly did for me.

Truth be told, I disliked myself way before I cleaned up.

I hated how I looked. I thought I was the crappiest son/sibling/friend on the face of the Earth. Certain relatives would tell me just that, and I believed them. There’s no question that I was a lousy friend when my best friend, Sean Marley, was sinking into depression and I was too worried about my career to notice.

That’s WHY I gave in to my addictions.

Even though my mental illness included a lot of fear and anxiety over getting sick or dying, I did a pretty good job of trying to kill myself. Not in a suicidal way. Not deliberately. But in the end, addiction is a compulsion — an ache — to repeat dangerous behavior even though you know what the likely consequences are.

It’s the weirdest irony there is.

But when you start to fight your demon head-on, you do become super-aware of your own vulnerabilities. For awhile, I became paralyzed by mine. Then I figured out how to get beyond it. But it took a lot of dirty work.

In his book, “Symptoms of Withdrawal,” Christopher Kennedy Lawford writes that after he kicked drugs in 1986, it still took him awhile to actually become a good person.

Those around him weren’t always happy he was sober, especially since that meant he couldn’t make the cocktails at family gatherings like he used to.

He writes about having to learn how to be a decent human being and be clean at the same time. You would think it’s easy. But it’s not.

In the book, Lawford writes:

“There is another great fiction of recovery — that is, once you stop using your life becomes a bed of roses. Anybody who has stayed sober for any length of time knows that living sober is about learning to live life on life’s terms and a good part of life is painful. When I got sober someone said to me that I would get to realize all my greatest fears in sobriety … You know what? He was right, and it’s not half as bad as I imagined.”

The man speaks the truth. And, by the way, I highly recommend his book to anyone struggling with addiction as well as the clean up:

I had a lot to learn, and I’m still learning. Learning how to be completely honest with my wife and drop my emotional wall was hard. I’m much better at it than I used to be, but I still have a lot of work to do there.

Being more disciplined with money is something I need to be better at. After all, spending is also an addictive behavior.

The list goes on.

But while the work goes on — and will continue to go on — there’s an important point to be made.

Somewhere along the way, I learned to like myself.

Today, I can honestly say I’m happy with the man I’ve become, even if I’m still pretty damn far from perfect.

But then perfect people don’t exist. If they did, they’d be pretty boring.

self hatred II by ~xiaoD
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Waiting for the Sun

The author on how longer days mean less depression — for him, anyway.

Mood music for this post: “Waiting for the Sun,” by The Doors:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0kypyGSKsE&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

I’m starting to feel it. The mental release that comes with longer periods of daylight.

Sure, everyone loves the longer days and everything else that marks the coming of spring. But in my case, longer days means a reduction in my Prozac intake. And that’s pretty freakin’ cool.

As I’ve written before, the cold grayness of winter and its shorter periods of daylight have a serious impact on my mental health. [More on that in Prozac Winter and The Mood Swing]

Ah, but the sunshine. It fires up every remaining cell in my brain.

It’s odd that I turned out this way. As a child, I used to prefer the winter and its shorter days. It was almost like a security blanket for me. It made me feel cozy as I hunkered down in my room.

Now it’s the opposite. I thrive on days where the sun starts rising around 4:30 a.m. and doesn’t set until close to 9 p.m.

Go figure.

The good news is that I didn’t wait until winter got the better of me. This time, in early December, I was waiting for it. I knew the Christmas season usually threw me into deep periods of depression, and when it hit this time I took action. I started this blog. And, I opened up about it with my therapist, who suggested an extra 20 MG of medication for the duration of winter.

It was a shaky start. One weekend I experienced wild mood swings where I was up one minute, down and angry the next. That was the brain readjusting to the dosage change.

It carried me through winter — still is — better than what I’ve lived through in previous years. [More on that in The Engine]

The goal now is to roll back the extra 20 MG I’ve been on later this month and go back to the previous level.

I think that’s going to work out just fine.